ValuePenguin Car Insurance Review: Spam Risk, Quotes, and More
ValuePenguin is a lead-generation tool with a free and easy quote process, but it routes you to other comparison sites and inundates you with phone calls, texts, and emails.
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Pros
- Easy online quote process
- Insurance experts available by phone
- Potential to save time and money
Cons
- Sells your personal information
- Lots of spam complaints
- No real-time insurance quotes
Bottom Line
ValuePenguin provides detailed reviews, pricing, and breakdowns of car, home, and health insurance products and companies. But instead of providing real-time insurance quotes from actual insurers, it redirects you to insurance-comparison sites to purchase your policy.
Plus, you’ll receive a lot of phone calls, text messages, and emails after submitting your phone number and email address. You may be better off using other comparison sites that offer actual insurance quotes.
ValuePenguin helps people make better spending decisions by offering free information and tools. It provides financial and insurance product reviews, including ones for car, home, and health insurance, as well as banking products. You can also get free car, renters, home, and health insurance quotes.
We put ValuePenguin to the test by going through the car insurance quote process on its website. This ValuePenguin review shows the step-by-step process, including the results, proving it’s a lead-generation tool rather than a true car insurance comparison website.
ValuePenguin: What to Know
ValuePenguin was launched in 2013 by three former financial analysts to help people use real-life data to choose financial products. It also developed a tool to help users compare health insurance quotes side by side in the same year.
ValuePenguin launched its credit card analysis and comparison tool the following year. By 2018, the website had received visits from more than 16 million unique visitors. LendingTree acquired ValuePenguin in 2019, and more than 10 million unique users visit the website each year.
You can access a large library of articles on auto, home, and health insurance products on the ValuePenguin site. Its breakdowns and calculators may help you make smarter financial decisions, and its insurance quote tool can provide a list of companies to get quotes from. Unfortunately, you may not receive actual quotes from insurance companies, as you’ll see below.
Despite some positive reviews, many customers complain about spam from third parties and insurance companies after entering their information. Be sure to read the fine print before submitting your information to understand what you consent to by requesting quotes from the site.
How to Compare Car Insurance Quotes on ValuePenguin
ValuePenguin allows you to enter your personal information once to receive and compare car insurance quotes — at least, that’s what it advertises.
To determine whether that’s true and what you can expect, we went through the quote process step-by-step for full-coverage car insurance.
The site is easy to navigate and walks you through the steps easily. Be prepared to provide:
- Your full name
- Date of birth
- Marital status
- Gender
- Vehicle garaging address
- Email address
- Year, make, and model of your vehicle
- Any infractions, like speeding tickets or accidents, you’ve had in the last three years
You must enter a valid email address before viewing your auto quotes on the final screen.
You also have to enter the address where you park your car (garaging address) and your phone number. Then click “Get My Auto Quotes.”
By clicking on “Get My Auto Quotes,” you consent to receive telemarketing mail, email, texts, and phone calls from multiple sources. We’ll discuss that more in the next section.
I received results from 10 companies — but they were from other comparison sites, not actual insurance companies. And none had actual rates, just a button advertising to “View My Rate.”
Once you click “View My Rate” to be taken to one of the results, you may have to re-enter your information or confirm what you provided to ValuePenguin to receive your actual auto insurance quote.
Compare Car Insurance Rates the Better Way
ValuePenguin Reviews: What Real Customers Are Saying
Although ValuePenguin offers a robust library of informative insurance and finance resources, its customer reviews are below average. So far, the comparison website hasn’t received reviews or a rating from the Better Business Bureau (BBB), Shopper Approved, or Clearsurance.
And it earns a poor rating on Trustpilot, with 2.3 out of 5 stars after six reviews. All six are 1-star reviews — each saying they received texts, phone calls, and emails from a bunch of companies. Here are three negative reviews left on Trustpilot that perfectly illustrate many users’ frustrations.
Despite its negative reviews, ValuePenguin has received overwhelmingly positive reviews on Glassdoor from its employees — though the most recent review below is from 2021.
Employees are happy with no office politics and report a caring management team. The team is small and rewarded with good pay and perks like free food, low-deductible health insurance, free gym memberships, and company dinners.
ValuePenguin vs. Compare.com
You can receive auto and home insurance quotes from both ValuePenguin and Compare.com. While both are user-friendly, offering step-by-step processes to receive quotes, only Compare.com provides rates from actual insurance companies.
ValuePenguin acts as a lead-generation tool, providing a list of comparison sites, including Compare.com, instead of real quotes with prices.
Compare.com received a near-perfect rating from Shopper Approved, but ValuePenguin isn’t rated. It also doesn’t have a rating with Clearsurance, while Compare has 4 out of 5 stars. It also isn’t rated or accredited by the BBB, while Compare.com has an A+ rating and has been accredited since June 2015.
Compare.com also has higher ratings on Trustpilot, as shown in the table below.
| Feature | ValuePenguin | Compare.com |
|---|---|---|
| Shopper Approved ratings | Not rated | 4.7 out of 5 |
| Clearsurance ratings | Not rated | 4 out of 5 |
| Trustpilot ratings | 2.3 out of 5 | 2.5 out of 5 |
| BBB rating | Not rated | A+ |
| Number of real-time quotes* | 0 | 8 |
*The number of real-time quotes generated is for a 30-year-old female living in Austin, Texas, driving a 2018 Toyota RAV4, with an at-fault accident in the last three years. The number of quotes you receive from each platform may vary based on your driver profile.
ValuePenguin vs. NerdWallet
While ValuePenguin focuses on home and auto insurance, NerdWallet is a personal finance website that focuses on a much broader range of topics, including insurance, credit cards, and investing.
Unlike ValuePenguin, NerdWallet doesn’t offer insurance quotes. Instead, it provides articles on each topic and prompts you to sign up for its Advisor services and rewards app. Both require you to purchase a monthly or annual subscription. ValuePenguin’s insurance comparisons are free to read.
ValuePenguin vs. The Zebra
The Zebra is another option, similar to ValuePenguin, where drivers can enter their personal, driving, and vehicle information to receive auto insurance quotes. It advertises you can receive car and home insurance quotes online in five minutes.
It also provides educational home and auto insurance articles, including insurance comparisons, like ValuePenguin. But The Zebra offers real-time quotes and doesn’t send you to other comparison sites as ValuePenguin does.
Is ValuePenguin a Spammy Site?
ValuePenguin can be classified as a spammy site, given reviews from real customers and its fine print under the “Get My Auto Quotes” button.
It clearly states that by clicking the button, you’re giving “written consent to telemarketing calls, text messages, emails, and postal mail from this website, our marketing and re-marketing networker, and up to eight insurance companies or their affiliates.”
That’s not to say you won’t get auto insurance quotes. But be prepared to receive a lot of emails, phone calls, and text messages from ValuePenguin and affiliates. After clicking the quote button, removing your information from its database, marketing networks, and affiliates may be difficult or even impossible.
Consider using a true comparison site or go directly to the insurer’s website to receive car insurance quotes.
ValuePenguin FAQs
Want to learn more about ValuePenguin? We’ve answered some of the most commonly asked questions below.
Is ValuePenguin easy to use?
Yes, ValuePenguin is easy to use. It walks you through the quoting process step-by-step. You can also call ValuePenguin to speak with a licensed insurance agent to compare auto, home, renters, or Medicare insurance products. ValuePenguin also provides articles on the same insurance topics.
Is ValuePenguin a trustworthy site?
Yes. ValuePenguin provides informative articles on various insurance topics. But to receive an insurance quote, you consent to receive phone calls, texts, mail, and emails from ValuePenguin, car insurance companies, networkers, and affiliate organizations.
You don’t have control over who receives your personal information and what they do with it. Many reviewers on websites such as the BBB and Trustpilot describe being bombarded with spam after entering their information on ValuePenguin.
Does it cost money to use ValuePenguin?
No, ValuePenguin is free to use. You can use the website to learn about home, auto, renters, and health insurance. You can also get free quotes for auto, renters, and home insurance online or call to get quotes, including Medicare health insurance quotes.
But when you provide your personal information to ValuePenguin, you consent to your information being provided to insurers, ValuePenguin networkers, and affiliates.
How does ValuePenguin make money?
ValuePenguin makes money through advertisements on its websites. It also receives affiliate income from companies it showcases on its website. Compensation can affect the offers you see and the order in which you receive recommendations.
Companies or product manufacturers that don’t compensate ValuePenguin may not show in reviews, recommendations, or articles on the website.
Methodology
Data scientists at Compare.com analyzed more than 50 million real-time auto insurance rates from more than 75 partner insurance providers in order to compile the quotes and statistics seen in this article. Compare.com’s auto insurance data includes coverage analysis and details on drivers’ vehicles, driving records, insurance histories, and demographic information.
All the quotes listed in this article have been gathered from a combination of real Compare.com quotes and external insurance rate data gathered in collaboration with Quadrant Information Services. Compare.com uses these observations to provide drivers with insight into how auto insurance companies determine their premiums.
Sources
- Better Business Bureau, “NerdWallet,” Accessed January 17, 2024.
- Better Business Bureau, “The Zebra,” Accessed January 17, 2024.
- Glassdoor, “ValuePenguin,” Accessed January 17, 2024.
- Trustpilot, “NerdWallet,” Accessed January 17, 2024.
- Trustpilot, “ValuePenguin,” Accessed January 17, 2024.
- Trustpilot, “The Zebra,” Accessed January 17, 2024.
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